Heavy Slash : SAO
by Stonebato
Summary: So this is my first fanfic ever. Tell me what you think yeah? Anyway, an exchange student and one of his friends decide to celebrate studying hard for a test the only way they know how, playing video games! And what better way than to celebrate with the very first VRMMORPG? Sword Art Online, the game everyone is talking about! Though neither knows just what is in store for them...
1. Prologue

*******My first fic, here goes absolutely nothing! Feedback would be very nice.*******

"And, I think we're done!"

Keith's desk was complete mess. Notebooks on a variety of subjects were scattered on it, open on various pages. On those pages were either dates, names, key terms or mathematical formulas, scraps of paper filled his wastebin. He decided it was better to organized the desk now before his foster mother decides to give him an earful about why he needs to keep things organized later on.

"Yeah...I think we've both studied as much as we can, Haruka-san."

"Now that still sounds very awkward coming from you, Keith-_san_."

Reclined on his bed while he was hunched over the notes, trying to sort them out, was the only daughter of the Iori household, Haruka. A healthy friendship formed between the two when he first arrived in Tokyo for the exchange student program. She was, after all, the one who dragged him to his foster home after his first day as an exchange student. The girl with the shoulder-length hair and the gigawatt smile whose optimism and laziness knew no bounds. This morning, she had volunteered to help him study for the upcoming test mainly because she hadn't studied for it yet.

"I've only been in Japan for the 2 months, don't expect big things from me just yet. In all honesty, I still have some trouble keeping up with class. It's not that I can't read Kanji, it's just that I'm slow reading it and I still need to ask people to repeat what they say every now and then."

"Well aren't you glad that you were sent to a foster family that knows how to speak English then?"

"Yes, I am. Except that I'm pretty sure my university would take that into consideration, the ability to at least communicate in English."

Except that being in a foster family wasn't on the agenda in the first place. The dormitory he was suppsoed to stay in was already full and his university had to find him a suitable place to stay. Thankfully one of the admin had connections and was able to get into an agreement with the Iori household to let him stay with them for the duration of 3 months. Living with a girl and going home with her every day made him the object of his fellow transferees' envy. He enjoyed bathing in it.

"Communicate in English PERFECTLY then AND willing to teach you Nihongo while you're here. Anyway, you're doing a good job learning our language, keep it up."

"Thanks."

"So how much longer are you going to stay here?"

"What? Afraid that you might lose your English mentor? I'll still be around for another month or so, but I'll be sure to sign up for the next exchange program and beg the admin to send me here again."

"Aren't you afraid that you'd lose the single most interesting person in your entire life?"

"You're really full of yourself aren't you?"

"Not full enough, I think I need more vitamin 'me.' Oh yeah, why don't we celebrate now. I mean we've studied our morning away, that seems plenty reason to celebrate already!"

"Celebrate? When we haven't even done the tests yet."

"I helped you study, you won't get any grade lower than 100%! You have the Haruka guarantee."

"Fine then."

"Yes! I'll just go get something from my room."

With that, his partner in crime had already disappeared leaving him alone to sort out notebooks and papers and neatly stack them on one side of his desk. She returned a minute later holding two helmets in her hands. The grin on her face just seemed to stretch wider.

"What's with the head safety gear, Haruka? Are we riding a motorcycle or something?"

"No, dummy, these are called NerveGears. I thought maybe an MMORPG might help us wind down. And it's not just any MMORPG, it is a VRMMORPG. Virtual Reality!"

"VR huh? I guess we'll be playing that Sword Art Online thing?"

"Yup! Here put it on, I'll hook everything up. When you're ready, close your eyes and say 'Link Start!' and it should activate the thing."

Haruka handed him one of the NerveGears. It looked like it would be a snug fit on his head, he glanced at the clock and the display showed 12:55pm. He looked over to Haruka who was humming some sort of tune as she plugged the helmets into the free slots on the router in his room. It was placed there since it gave the best coverage throughout the house.

"Well shall we get started, Keith?"

"I guess, don't you want to just take a nap or something?"

"Normally I would but I think I can take an hour or so off my afternoon for this. The servers start up at one pm after all and this is something I've been dying to play with a friend. So, since we're both directly connected to the router and I think we both need to be lying down...I think, you wouldn't mind sharing the bed with me for an hour right?"

Keith turned red at the thought of sharing the bed with a girl, with Haruka of all people. Though he could probably brag about this to his friends and that would elevate the envy to greater heights. In any case, Haruka began setting up.

"I trust you, that's why I'm here instead of my room."

"Yeah, I'll just roll out the extra futon under my bed."

"Aww, I get the bed all to myself? Thank you!"

"Stop jumping to conclusions, Haruka."

Keith glanced over to Haruka who was already snug on his bed and had the NerveGear on.

"I'm claiming it anyway. When you finish up the prep work go look for the player named 'Stahl,' see you on the other side noob. LINK START!"

He put the NerveGear over his head and laid down on the futon on the floor. He really had intended for Haruka to use the bed after all. The visor displayed the battery status as well as the current time, 1:02pm. His room was very quiet with Haruka already logged into the game, everything was shut down except for the two NerveGears. There was nothing else left to do.

"Link start."

It felt like he was freefalling down a tube as solid lines of colors just zoomed past him, with a blank white space as the background. The system began what looked like a check of his five senses and all of them had a green 'OK' on them. A prompt for language was displayed and he had settled on the language he was comfortable in 'English.' At the very least he could understand the game, even if he might have some difficulty understanding the players. Then he was prompted to log in with the account he had made just minutes ago. Finally he had been asked to create his own avatar for the game as well as name him.

'Steel.' The system accepted his name for the 5 foot 11 eleven somewhat tanned man with the clean shaven face and the black head of slicked back hair. Steel wore a green shirt over dark brown pants and similarly dark brown boots. His eyes matched the color of his shirt and the face wasn't all that remarkable, so much so that he could be mistaken for a normal mook.

**WELCOME TO SWORD ART ONLINE!**

He was plunged into a tunnel of light so bright he had to squeeze his eyes shut so that he wouldn't blind himself before he could try out whatever this virtual reality business was. After the sensation of movement had passed Steel slowly opened his eyes to find himself in the middle of a circular plaza. Streams of blue light opened up near him and as those streams faded, people took their place. He looked down to see his body and moved his limbs around. Everything felt so real, the excitement brought an unconscious smile to his lips.

Haruka wanted to celebrate by starting an adventure he guessed. Not that he was against it at all, Just knowing that he was in a different world and embarking on all sorts of adventures was enough to wash away the bland taste in his mouth after studying for 5 hours on end. She had told him to look for a player named Stahl but maybe that could wait until after he was done being a tourist and getting amazed by almost everything that's happening around him.

The fact that he was probably the only English speaker in this game didn't seem to matter much. He could understand bits and pieces of what the others were saying anyway, enough to get the main idea and everything. He was also confident in his ability to hold some semblance of a conversation as well so it wouldn't be that much of a problem plus he had Haruka as a crutch anyway.

Steel felt a hand literally crash against his back, almost flooring him. It seemed like someone wanted a fight so early in the game, he would be happy to oblige them. He spoke in somewhat broken japanese.

"What's your...problem?"

Steel found himself face to chest with a man who towered over him, his voice began to falter. He had a well groomed beard, a chiseled jaw and his hair seemed to be tied into a neat STALLIONTAIL. Ponytail couldn't even qualify as an understatement. The man was also muscular as if the tree trunks he called his arms wasn't any obvious indication. He was clad in a leather vest worn over a white shirt, dark brown pants and boots as well as fingerless gloves that covered like half his forearm. His arms crossed his chest and his face had a somewhat mischievous smile on it. The man responded with a booming voice and perfect English.

"Glad you could make it noob. I didn't expect myself to be so superior that you'd parody my character's name. Steel."

"Ha-Haruka?!"

"In the digital flesh, but around here I'm Stahl so keep it that way, Steel. Anyway let's get you geared up."

Steel watched as Stahl began moving his hands in the air infront of him as if he was keying in something on a touchpad or a keypad. Soon a prompt popped up in the space in front of him.

_The player Stahl would like to request a trade.  
><em>_[Yes] [No]_

"We haven't got all day, Steel, accept the trade so I can dump my low level gear onto you. Unless of course you want to fight with that tiny knife of yours?"

Steel pressed the [Yes] button and another window showed up. Stahl on the other hand, began moving his hands in the air again and then some items appeared on the window as well as a green check beside all of them. He scanned the list to find some basic armor as well as a sword and some potions and 50 cor. He had nothing to give in return and just pressed the [Confirm] button on the lower part of the window.

Another prompt came up that said that he has acquired the said items from Stahl.

"Where did you get all this, Ha-Stahl?"

"Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that I was a CBT player. So I already have a headstart. Anyway equip those items and let me show you the ropes. I'll train you in the most Spartan way you can imagine, Steel."


	2. Chapter 1

*****Edited bits of the prologue to match the canon as best as I could. I plan to add another OC soonish but I'm fresh out of concepts atm, so some ideas from you guys would be nice too. I also think I went a little bit overboard with this one, my hands couldn't stop, I swear. As usual, feedback would be nice.***  
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"You can do this, Steel."

Stahl lent a hand to his fallen comrade and pulled him up off the ground.

He promised Steel that he'd show the guy the ropes, and also guaranteed that it'd be a Spartan training session. They started with Stahl taking care of a few Dire Wolves roaming the grasslands outside the Town of Beginnings. It was to show Steel the basics of how things just worked in SAO, which were pretty intuitive in itself. The tricky part of this whole session was how to activate certain sword skills in the game. They hadn't taken a break since leaving the Town of Beginnings and it was probably taking its toll on Steel who was a fresh character and whose player didn't have experience in the business of playing VR games. In truth, Stahl himself had trouble the first few times too during the beta testing of the game.

Stahl had decided that a Frenzy Boar would be a nice training dummy for his companion to practice using basic Sword Skills on. Being able to activate the more complicated or awkward pre-motion Sword Skills in an actual fight was something he wanted to teach his companion. Despite the fact that simple slashes can get one through most of the first floor relatively unscathed.

"Again, the boar is readying for another charge. Use Rage Spike to answer with your own charge. Drop low, lean forward, keep the sword parallel to your right leg, draw it back and let the system take over. You can do it."

The boar began kicking the dirt, an obvious 'tell' on what it was about to do. It would slam itself into Steel again if he couldn't pull this off. Stahl was particular about this exercise, no sword skill other than Rage Spike would be used to hit that boar. Though Stahl himself had difficulty executing the skill the first time around, he would be impressed if Steel could pull it off before his health bar reaches zero.

He simply observed his companion get into position once more. Just a few hits in and Steel already had a good pre-motion stance, now all he had to do was pull the sword back. He noticed something off with the way Steel was holding the sword and decided to rectify it immediately.

"You're letting the sword drop, keep it parallel to the right leg and pull. Don't think, pull!"

Stahl watched on, stunned, as his companion sped forward like a bullet shot out of a gun. Keith was a fast learner, after all, so it wouldn't be a stretch to say that that speed could carry on into learning the mechanics of a game. It was still a surprise either way. Trails of light blue energy were left in the wake of his companion's charge. The skill itself wasn't anything special, just a lunging stab, but the effects of the skill were still pretty to look at. That said, the boar didn't exactly die yet and Stahl moved to remedy that problem.

He lifted his sword above the boar and let it crash down with all onto it. With all the force he could muster behind the swing, it effectively bisected the beast, shattering it into a shower of data.

"I told you could it. I'm actually impressed you didn't die with the amount of hits you received to the face. Are you sure your thick skull wasn't uploaded into your character?"

"I...I...I'm not sure anymore. But hey, I was able to pull it off. Can we take...a break?"

"Yeah go ahead, take five. When you're all good let's log out and have some lunch."

Steel didn't respond anymore, he just plopped down onto the ground. His chest was still heaving from the exhaustion of endless beatings he endured ever since he stepped out of the Town of Beginnings. They both probably looked forward to the prospect of logging out and having some semblance of an edible lunch, since their mother and father were both out of the house. Haruka decided that since their time was coming to a close for the day, she didn't need to be in character anymore. She didn't need to be the hulking hardass Stahl anymore for the day.

"Looking forward to what we'll dig up from the local convience store, Keith?"

"Keith? What happened being Steel and Stahl?"

"Well, I think we've had enough make-believe for the day. I'll probably nap the rest of the day away. I mean you could still come back here if you wanted to. I, the natural genius, have already taught you the basics of surviving this place."

"Right. There's just so much green here, it's actually beautiful."

"I know right, it feels so real too. I mean I could explain the science but let's not ruin the magic."

"Yeah, I'd rather you don't."

"Well enough sightseeing, let's log out. I mean we still have to properly address the issue of lunch."

"Alright then...how do I log out?"

"Just bring down the menu and log out should be at the bottom, under settings."

"Alright then."

Keith swiped down in the space infront of him and then jabbed his finger on where the bottom of the menu was. His brow furrowed and he frowned and jabbed his finger again.

"Yeah, the log out button doesn't seem to be working, Haruka."

"What? That can't be right. Let me try."

Haruka swiped down on the space in front of her and the menu popped up. She scrolled down the list until the log out button was in view, after going into settings, and then pressing it. However the log out button really wasn't working as pressing it didn't seem to disconnect her from the servers.

"That's odd. Well it's probably some sort of glitch or something. Let's just wait it out, I'm sure someone will come up with a hotfix before today is over. Well back to being Stahl and Steel. I think people would flip if they found out an actual girl is playing this hulking mountain of meat and muscle...not that it would even be believable right?"

"Yeah sure, I mean GIRL is probably in effect here. GIRL being Guy In Real Life."

"Good. I guess that's another acronym I have to keep in mind? English seems like a hassle in its own right."

"Hey look at those two guys, seems like you aren't the only one who wanted to hold some sort of tutorial session."

Stahl looked over to where Steel was pointing. In the distance were two other players in the grasslands, fighting boars and whatever else was out here. It didn't seem like there was anything remarkable about the pair, they seemed like your ordinary players. Except that one of the two was clearly a newbie, just like Steel and wasn't used to the game's system yet. This gave him an idea.

"Think they'd agree to pit their noob against you?"

"Let's not. Please. I'm feeling sore all over already."

"Yeah, but you're not exactly sore. You just think you are."

"A slight tingling then."

"Which isn't exactly being sore. It's all thanks to the pain dampening they installed in this game."

The duo spent their time spectating the other two players going about their training session. The guy who looked like he knew what he was doing was dressed in blue while the other guy with the headband had a white shirt not unlike Stahl's. That pair soon moved on to other parts of the grasslands after executing a few sword skills on the mobs that spawned around their area. The handband guy seemed pretty pleased with himself pulling off the initial sword skill and started practicing it against nothing in particular.

"Well I think I should give you a tour of the Town of Beginnings while we're stuck here."

"Nah."

"What?"

"Nah. I'd rather focus on getting better at activating Sword Skills on the fly."

"Alright then. Follow me, we're not gonna go in their direction, wouldn't wanna look like stalkers plus I think you could improve better against more than just one opponent and we don't end up stealing their farm."

Stahl led both of them to places he could remember encountering numerous weak mobs. He still let Steel deal with the monsters alone and handed him an extra potion or two from his stash every now and then. Though he could only do Rage Spike, Steel looked like he was already falling into a rhythm with his movements so that he wouldn't have to be at an awkward position to launch Rage Spike in the middle of a combo.

Soon the day seemed like was winding down to a close.

The clang of swords striking each other rang as Steel came at Stahl only to be parried. Though Stahl had the advantage, he never pressed the openings he created parrying Steel's attacks. The idea was to simply keep his guard up while his sparring partner tried to break through it. Tried and then met with very little success. His partner's increasingly hurried attacks meant that he was getting desperate to land a successful attack. Somehow the attacks became heavier and heavier and it was harder to maintain the guard. Even though the attacks themselves came from the same direction, the follow ups always came in fast. If this kept up then the guard was as a good as shattered, it was just a matter of "when." Stahl took the initiative and dodged the attack, sending his gloved hand crashing straight into Steel's face, knocking him off his feet and sending him to the floor.

"You were getting too desparate, Steel. Calm down. Tr-"

The attention of both players were held by the bells tolling back in the Town of Beginnings. It was loud enough for them to hear it in their neck of the grasslands. Stahl briefly wondered why the bells were tolling when his vision was flooded with a bright light. In an instant he found himself back at the central plaza of Town of Beginnings and not just him but Steel and all the other players too. So it wasn't some sort of secret Beta Tester meeting then.

"Why are we back here?"

"I have no idea why we're ported back here."

The bell stopped ringing and the gathered crowd seemed to follow suit. The silence and tension was almost tangible. Stahl opened up the menu again and tried to log out, except this time the log out button did not even exist anymore. He reigned himself in and kept his mouth shut. Someone pointed out something above them, it was a bit hard to make out from the distance but it seemed to say "WARNING," just red one panel in the sky that said "WARNING." That seemed like a very good cause for concern and he was right when the panel multiplied all across the sky painting it red. As if that wasn't enough, blood seemed to seep through the small gaps between the panels, swirling into what looked like a sphere just above the gathered crowd. The sphere turned into a large person covered by a red cloak that had golden linings. The person hovered above everyone else, no one could see his legs nor face but his hands were clearly visible.

"Is that some sort of admin?"

"Like I said, no idea. What I do know is that I don't like this."

The man spoke in a booming voice. Stahl echoed in English what the man had said.

"Attention, players. Welcome to my world. I am Akihiko Kayaba and I am the only one in control of this world. I am sure you have noticed the absence of a logout button in the main menu. This is not a defect in the game. It is a feature of Sword Art Online. You cannot log out and no one from the outside can remove your NerveGear. If it is attempted, the NerveGear's transmitter will emit a powerful microwave which will destroy your brain, ending your life."

"Wait what? This is a joke right? It's gotta be a joke. This would kill the game's revenues."

"Joke or not, I don't think we can do anything about this, Keith. Let's just see this thing through and plan accordingly, yeah?"

"Y-yeah..."

"...Unfortunately, the friends and family of some of the players have ignored the warning. 213 players died as a result. Damn, I think mom and dad are just gonna leave the thing on. I hope that they leave the thing on."

"You and me both, Haruka."

A bunch of displays floated around Kayaba as he continued talking about how SAO has gained its infamy. Haruka wanted this all to just stop. She wanted to believe that she had fallen asleep during the studying session and that she didn't just drag Keith along with her in this death trap. The revive function was even removed which made this doubly dangerous. Haruka felt the weight of the guilt on her shoulders, she had condemned the life of her friend. The hands of her avatar unconsciously balled into fists and it would have probably drawn blood if they were in the real world.

"There is only one means of escape, completing the game. Defeat floor bosses to go up in levels until you clear the 100th floor. You are currently in the lowest level."

All they had to do was clear the game then and they could escape. It won't be easy but at least there was a way out of this death trap after all, she just had to keep Keith and herself alive throughout this ordeal. Naturally, since she already had an idea on how the game worked and at least knowledge on what to expect in the first five or so floors. That was something.

"I also have a present for all of you in your storage, please see for yourselves."

A present? Haruka opened her menu and checked her storage. An item called a "mirror" appeared in it among the various loot she had gathered accompanying Keith around the grasslands and teaching him whatever she could. She glanced to see Keith's avatar do the same. She placed a tentative finger on the item and a simple square mirror materialized in front of her avatar. Again, like the teleportation her vision was obscured by a blinding light and as the light faded from her eyes, she found that everyone had gotten taller. She could also feel the avatar's body become lighter.

"Stahl, you good?"

"Yeah."

Something was off about the pitch of the avatar's voice as well. Haruka remembered manually adjusting the pitch herself but it seemed leagues higher than it should. She turned to face Steel but instead found Keith, the messy brown-haired, green-eyed, and fair-skinned Keith staring back at her. No doubt her face was a mask of surprise as that seemed to be the case with Keith. He looked surprised as well.

"Haruka? Did you change your avatar or something while I wasn't looking?"

"I could say the same for you!"

"How about we look at the mirrors at the count of three. One."

"Two."

"THREE."

Haruka was speechless to see who was staring back at her from the mirror's reflection. It was none other than her own self. It wasn't that everyone got taller, she just shrunk back to her old size. It wasn't that the pitch was off, the pitch clearly mimicked her own. It was as if something carbon copied her and then replaced Stahl with herself. The stalliontail had been replaced with her black hair cascading down to her shoulders. The beard was gone among other things. Thankfully, her gear was still her size, even though they were effectively men's clothes.

Haruka was brought out of her self inspection when Kayaba began to speak again. This time it was about why he had done it. He created SAO just to interfere with it.

"This ends the tutorial for the official Sword Art Online launch. Good luck, players."

Kayaba's avatar began to distort and melt turning back into that blood-like substance and went back to where it came from, back between the gaps of those "WARNING" panels. The panels themselves disappeared and Aincrad was once again back in its pre-dusk state. What had happened was surreal for Haruka, it stunned her and everyone else into silence. Their brains didn't completely process what had transpired yet. The tension was once again palpable.

The crowd, once released from their stupor began to rage, to panic, it was chaos and mass confusion. Haruka still stood frozen on the spot, realizing that all this was probably real. She was pushed this way and that before someone finally pulled her out of the crush.

"Looks like that wasn't a joke then eh? So what's the plan now, Haruka?"

Haruka could hear the voice and but it felt like she was listening to it on a speaker. It was near but far at the same time. She could feel something grip her shoulders and she heard her name being called out, sharply this time, sharp enough to cut through the numbing feeling that enveloped her.

"HARUKA!"

"Y-yes?"

"This is not the time to be spacing out. What's the plan?"

"I-I don't- I'm sorry, Keith. I'm sorry I got you into this mess. If-If only...I"

"Yeah, if only's don't exist in the real world or this world. Look, I think you just need a long walk and maybe a scrap or two, alright?"

Keith grabbed hold of her hand and gently led her toward the City's outskirts. She meekly followed, like a lamb herded by the shepherd. She could hear him speak in a significantly more serious tone.

"I need you to get it together, Haruka. I think you're our only shot at getting out of here in one piece. I don't blame you for this but I'd like that Spartan Instructor back. Steel and Stahl right?"


	3. Chapter 2

*****Forgive me for any language butchering I might commit here and in future chapters.*

"Welcome to Horunka! Though I think we're kinda early."

"You don't say. Not that many players around here yet."

Keith took a look around Horunka. After Haruka had "recovered" she had immediately recommended they go to Horunka to beat the early rush. She reasoned that most of the new players would probably stick around the initial city and hunt that place to death. It would be better to get a headstart despite the fact that doing so carries the risk of dying since they were both underleveled for the zone.

In an attempt to conserve whatever resources they acquired from spending the majority of their cor, they decided to only engage the mobs that would engage them along the way. However, the problem was to balance the exp gain with the limited hp potions that Haruka purchased before they began running off into the sunset. Keith didn't want to think about what might happen if Haruka didn't recover when she did.

They had both squandered a day or to in the grasslands and the initial city with Keith helping Haruka take her mind off of things the day after that dreadful launch speech. In fact she even scolded him for not taking any initiative despite her "broken down" state, that they could have made better time if he didn't linger around the Starting City waiting for her to "get better." Keith defended himself by saying that he had no idea where Horunka would have been nor could he have known what to do in the game.

Still, Keith expected that Horunka, the second hub on the first floor, would have more people in it by now. It hadn't taken them that much time to get to Horunka but they were only two people whose heads were roughly in the game. It would be harder to ferry more people, scared people between the two places. Most would probably just stay in the Town of Beginnings until this all blows over, which according to Haruka, would probably take "a very long time." Keith was sure that he didn't just want to sit around doing nothing for "a very long time."

For now, Keith would follow Haruka on the generally vacant streets of Horunka. Heh, Haruka, Horunka. There really wasn't much to look at. According to Haruka there are only ten structures in this village, an inn, a weapon shop and a tool shop. The rest are just player houses of varying prices. Which probably explained why there weren't so many people around.

"So what's the plan, Haruka?"

"The plan? Well I originally wanted us to rush to Tolabana to get a really gigantic lead over the other players but I don't think that'd work."

"Why not?"

"We'd have to go through either Horunka and the forest in the northwest or the lake in the northeast and then the mountains before we even get there. The lake and the forest are two manageable regions with regards to our levels, IF we play it smart. The mountains are impossible for us right now."

"Right then, so I guess we stay and grind here for a bit?"

"Yes. We'll stay and grind and get our gear updated. The equipment they sell here are a step above what you'd find in the Town of Beginnings. Plus, we wouldn't have much competition in terms of hunting around here we can sell the junk drops for more cor. While we're at it, what weapon category are you going to use...mainly I mean?"

"I guess a sword?"

"Good, probably the most overused weapon type in this game. I'll pick up the sword AND board then."

"There are other weapon types?"

"Yeah. We've got our boring but reliable swords, there's also some very elegant rapiers and heavy stuff like battleaxes and greatswords plus katanas. Though most of the initial drops are for swords and we still need the initial sword skills to effectively use the other weapons. Don't lie to me, you've tried just wildly swinging your sword and it does nothing right?"

"R-right."

"That's because we need to rely on the system to execute our attacks for us. Like I said when we first started, Pre-motions are our best friends."

"I'll keep that in mind then."

"Let's just go hit the local inn. I'm starving. We can deal with the specifics after lunch! Follow me!"

It didn't take long to reach the inn, which was arguably the biggest building in this ghost town. A few npcs took their seats and another one was manning the bar, there were some players too but they looked like the kind of crowd that kept to themselves. Despite the amount of people present, it still felt somewhat empty. Probably because there were still a lot of vacant tables. The place itself was well-kept however, so that means the staff here probably take their work very seriously, even if they are just digital representations.

"Go have get us a seat, Keith. I'll get us some food and we can plan our next move over a haunch of boar meat maybe."

"If you say so."

Haruka made her way to the bar and probably began splurging on food. She never really did know how to contain her appetite and apparently she had a speedy metabolism which explains why she never gets fat. The thought of having to eat this digitzed food for "a long time" unsettled him though. How long would it take for them to clear this game and get back home? How would the world receive them when they did get back home? If they don't clear this thing fast, he would be very late to his own graduation from his degree program.

Before he could think more about his life outside this simulation, a hand lightly smacked his back derailed his train of thought and sent it crashing, leaving it a burning wreck. Keith turned to face the owner of the hand, half expecting it to be Haruka but finding himself staring in confusion at a grinning stranger. The stranger in question wore a neat ponytail and sported an equally neat beard, he was obviously older than Keith. The man's eyes twinkled with intelligence and his teeth shined white like a model's. And the man spoke in Japanese. Outstanding.

The only parts Keith could make out were "you" and that was probably about it. He tried to keep his best "interested" face on but kept stealing glances at Haruka's general direction. The man didn't seem to stop talking which was good except that he couldn't find Haruka anymore which was bad and that the man was looking at him expectedly which was also bad. He was probably asked a question but he had no idea what the question was.

"Um...uhhh..."

Before he could embarrass himself, Haruka appeared out of nowhere with the food that she ordered. The man stepped aside to let Haruka through and made some sort of comment he also couldn't understand. She set the plates of steaming meat down on the table before turning to face the man and conversing in Japanese. Again, he could only ever make out bits and pieces of what they were talking about. The silver lining in all this is that if he does make it out alive he's probably going to be fluent in Japanese. He has to adapt to the world after all. In any case, the two were having a good laugh about something or other. Haruka turned to face Keith and addressed him.

"The guy was asking if you were a beta tester or not since you were seated alone and looked so serious. I do agree that you might get mistaken for one if your eyebrows are permanently furrowed. So I clarified the situation."

Keith glanced over to the man and saw him bow the "standard greeting" bow. The grin didn't seem to leave his face at all. He still looked a bit positive, all things considered. Which meant that he might be a little bit insane or he's one of those people who see silver linings in everything. The man stepped forward and introduced himself to Keith.

"Boku wa Taitussu! " (I am Titus!)

"Ummm uhhh Yoroshiku(Nice to meet you)...watashi no namae wa Steel(my name is Steel)...did I even get that right?"

"Not bad, I guess. You know what? I think I'll do the talking a for while."

"Good idea and thanks."

"Yeah."

While Haruka was busy playing diplomat with Titus, Keith focused his attention on the food. Though he may have wanted to eat already, it just didn't feel right if he didn't wait for Haruka. He was caught in limbo for a short while but was liberated after Haruka concluded the negotiations and sat across him. Meanwhile the bulky Titus took a seat next to Keith. He was confused at this sudden development and looked at Haruka.

"Oh yeah. He's joining us for a bit. He'll be moving onto Tolbana in earlier than we are."

"Alright then."

"ITADAKIMASU!"

"And he's also very hungry since he sorta kinda ran out of cor. So I offered him my food, I'll ju-"

Keith slid his plate over to Haruka before she could finish her sentence.

"Nah, I'll go get something for myself. Because you do know that I'm not that much of a carnivore like you are right?"

"Oh okay. T-thanks."

"No problem."

Keith ordered something cheaper for himself, partly because he wanted to keep some semblance of a wallet and partly because ordering the same thing as Haruka would probably make them bankrupt which was probably why Titus was starving. In the end he returned to the table with a piping hot bowl of some sort of meat stew. He took his place beside Titus and began to eat.

Titus began speaking in Japanese again and Haruka was responding in kind. Keith wondered what they were talking about but didn't dwell too much on it. The important thing was that they had a new party member although a temporary one. The guy looked big and strong which probably means he leans more toward the two-handed weapon styles, but that was before Keith saw the rapier strapped to the side of this big man's frame.

A big guy with a toothpick for a weapon. Interesting.


End file.
